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Eugene Nyathi, an Elder from Avondale Christian Church in Harare, Zimbabwe, organised a worship seminar at Highway Gospel Church in Durban, South Africa.
About 25 people from the worship team gathered at the Costopoulos house with expectant hearts. Kim sent us this report.
“Do we feel that we are walking in a way that is pleasing to God? Do we feel that God is leading us?
You will know if your life is pleasing to God, because the Spirit will tell you. When you are fighting against the Lord, you know it. We need to bring our lives before Him, and He consumes our lives and this opens the door…”
Eugene began by stating that worship is not music, but that music can be worship. Reading from 2 Chr. 7:1-10, he said, “When our lives are offered to God as a sacrifice, it opens the door for our gifts, and our talents. Because, if my life is in my own hands, I can do whatever I like, but it will not please God. But when our sacrifice pleases God, it allows everyone to take their place and do what is on their hearts for God. We need to understand the spiritual meaning of the word sacrifice.”
Worship is not singing songs, it is a life surrendered to God, a willingness to deny oneself, the attitude of: ‘Lord, here I am, do whatever you want with my life.’; following Jesus, the sacrifice He made, allowing death to take place; that my ministry, my offering, and my worship to the Lord becomes my life. God looks at our whole life, and we need to ask ourselves: ‘Are we walking in obedience and submitting our lives to the Lord?’
The talents we have are gifts that God has given us to encourage His people to worship Him. Our lives need to be consumed by God every day, so that we may live our lives for Him.
My skill or my talent, my gift, cannot come before my ‘given-ness’ to God. God needs to deal with things in my heart and in my life. We can easily try to bring a ‘skilful’ sacrifice, but God seeks a heart. That sacrifice needs to die on the altar so that it can live for Christ. We need to ask ourselves: ‘Am I walking with God, am I allowing God to have His way in me?’ We can only sing this as an expression of our hearts when we have understood sacrifice and experienced dying to what we want.
When God shows us something in our life, we need to accept it. We cannot be like Satan, who had pride and vanity, and wanted to be like God. Even though we are in front of the worship team and before the whole church, we are not there to perform; our worship needs to come from a broken life. God is looking for true worshippers, who will worship Him in spirit and truth; that will not come from an instrument, but from our lives. When my life pleases God, then the rest will follow.
For us, who are part of the worship team, relationships are very important. We need to be known by the leaders of the church. Our lives need to be transparent before the elders. There must be a relationship where we share what we are facing – our victories, our struggles, and our failings.
He finished by saying that we cannot depend on our gifts and talents because satan can offer the best song, with the best voice. But God is not looking for the best abilities, although they have their place, but a state of heart, because that is where worship begins.
There has to be a balance between the practical side and the spiritual side. It is good to have a gift or skill, but everything has to take its proper place. First is the place of sacrifice, of being broken; that’s when God is pleased, from there, there is room for playing skilfully and practising in order to improve oneself.
“Being part of the team is that everyone uses their gifts and talents together for the purpose of worshipping the Lord.”
WOW! We were so challenged in our hearts and there was a buzz that morning as we all enjoyed the beautiful sunny day and a cup of tea. We finished off the worship seminar with a picnic lunch in the garden. Then, it was a time of sharing and enjoying some fellowship with each other before departing. Many left after lunch, but a few younger folk stayed behind to play mini soccer and another handful of brothers and sisters remained for the rest of the afternoon to socialise and catch up on what has been happening in our busy lives.
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